Bushman boys
© Survival

A London barrister has criticized the UK’s Foreign Office for failing to acknowledge on its website that the Botswana government illegally and forcibly removed Gana and Gwi Bushmen from their ancestral lands.

Gordon Bennett represented the Bushmen in their four-year legal battle against the Botswana government after it evicted them from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve. The case was the longest and most expensive the country has ever seen, and culminated in 2006 when the Botswana High Court ruled that the evictions were illegal and unconstitutional and that the Bushmen have the right to live in the reserve.

However, Mr Bennett has criticized the Foreign Office for failing to address this in its country profile of Botswana. ‘Its website refers to arguments advanced by the government to justify its relocation of the Bushmen, but it does not explain that the court ruled that the relocation was indeed unlawful’.

Mr Bennett also challenged the Foreign Office’s reference to a ‘constructive dialogue’ between the Bushmen and the government, which it describes as ‘ongoing’. ‘I remain in regular contact with Bushmen who have returned to the reserve’, he said, ‘but do not believe that any of them have participated in discussions with the government’.

The Foreign Office also says nothing of the government’s continued policy of preventing the Bushmen from returning home by banning them from accessing a water borehole on their lands, at the same time as drilling more boreholes for wildlife and allowing the opening of safari lodges with swimming pools on the Bushmen’s lands. Nor does it mention the legal proceedings recently launched by the Bushmen in a bid to gain access to their borehole.

Mr Bennett said, ‘The FCO will understandably not want to take sides in this dispute, but its website is in danger of misleading the public. I am surprised that it makes no reference at all to the difficulties faced by Bushmen denied their human right to water’.

The Foreign Office’s profile of Botswana is at odds with the US State Department’s 2008 report, which heavily criticizes the government for its ‘continued narrow interpretation of a 2006 high court ruling’. While the FCO notes the government’s claim that evicting the Bushmen ‘was necessary to enable them to benefit from the country’s development’, the US report acknowledges they were ‘forcibly resettled’ and describes the Bushmen as ‘economically and politically marginalized’ and without ‘access to their traditional land’.

The UN Special Rapporteur for indigenous peoples, Professor James Anaya, also recently condemned the Botswana government for denying the Bushmen access to water which he describes as not in keeping with the ‘spirit and underlying logic of the [2006 High Court] decision, nor with the relevant international human rights standards’. Anaya also called on the government to reactivate the borehole ‘as a matter of urgent priority’.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry added, ‘The Foreign Office is failing in its duty to give the British public an accurate picture of Botswana’s human rights record. Anybody considering going to Botswana should be aware of the government’s continued persecution of the Bushmen so they can make an informed decision about whether or not this is a country they want to visit.’

A Jarawa man and boy by the side of the Andamans Trunk Road
© Salomé

Weeks after the last member of the Bo tribe died on the Andaman Islands, an Indian court has moved to protect the neighbouring Jarawa tribe by suspending the operation of a controversial tourist resort.

India’s Supreme Court ordered on Monday that the company, Barefoot India, must close its resort near the Jarawa’s reserve, pending further deliberation by the court.

Despite concerns for the future of the tribe, Barefoot had challenged the legality of a ‘buffer zone’ around the reserve. The buffer zone was designed to protect the Jarawa by preventing tourism and other commercial activity near their land. The resort lies within the disputed zone.

But concerns remain over a highway running illegally through the tribal reserve, and the poachers, tourists and other outsiders it brings into daily contact with the Jarawa. The Indian government has ignored a 2002 Supreme Court ruling that the road must be closed.

Most of the Bo tribe, whose last member Boa Sr died in January, died of diseases brought by British colonists in the nineteenth century. The Jarawa, who resisted contact with outsiders until 1998, are expected to have little immunity to many outside infections and could be wiped out by an epidemic.

Many of Barefoot’s visitors will have recently stepped off long-haul flights. Research indicates that about 20% of airline passengers develop colds or other viral infections within a few days of their flight.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘Nobody wants to see the Jarawa go the same way as Boa Sr’s people. This week’s court decision to suspend the Barefoot resort is a positive sign. But if the Indian government is serious about protecting the Jarawa it must close the road and keep intruders off their land.’

Nukak mother and child.
© David Hill/Survival

Two indigenous Colombian leaders are on a European tour to launch an international campaign aimed at protecting at least eighteen tribes facing the ‘imminent risk of extinction’.

The campaign is being launched as indigenous peoples in Colombia suffer ‘massive violations of their rights’, says ONIC, the country’s national indigenous peoples’ organisation. These violations are caused by ‘the internal armed conflict in Colombia, the lack of social and differential policies on the part of the Colombian state for indigenous peoples, and the imposition of a devastating development model in indigenous territories.’

The two leaders, Luis Fernando Arias Arias and Neida Janeth Yepes Rodriguez, are due to speak at a public event at Amnesty International’s Human Rights Action Centre in London on Tuesday 16 March.

One of the aims of the campaign, coordinated by ONIC and other indigenous organisations, is to raise ‘awareness in Colombian society and in the international community of the high risk of extinction suffered by indigenous peoples. . . Of these peoples, eighteen have a population of less than 200, and 10 have a population of less than 100.’

ONIC ‘considers that the critical situation for the indigenous peoples of Colombia is the responsibility of all of humanity. When an indigenous people disappears, a whole world is gone, with its respective culture, spiritual vision, language, ancestral knowledge, and traditional practices.’

One of the tribes at risk is the Nukak, many of whom have been driven from their land by Colombia’s civil war.

The launch of the campaign comes shortly after the death of the last member of a tribe in India, a tragedy that made global headlines.

Spokespeople from Survival, Amnesty and ABColombia are also due to speak at the event in London.

Where: Amnesty International UK, The Human Rights Action Centre, 17-25 New Inn Yard, EC2 3EA

When: Tuesday 16 March 18:30-20:30

Act now to support the Nukak.

Mark Rylance has been a Survival supporter for many years.
© Mark Rylance

Survival is proud to announce ‘WE ARE ONE – a celebration of tribal peoples’, a fundraising evening in aid of Survival International created and directed by Mark Rylance, on Sunday 18 April at the Apollo Theatre in London.

The evening will be a performance of tribal prose and poetry from some of the UK and Hollywood’s leading actors and musicians including Julie Christie, Mackenzie Crook, Sinead Cusack, Colin Firth, Emilia Fox, Michael Gambon, Sophie Okonedo, Mark Rylance, Danny Sapani, John Sessions, Kevin Spacey, Juliet Stevenson, Ken Stott, Zoe Wanamaker, and James Wilby.* There will also be a performance by Bruce Dickinson, Jon Lord and Ian Paice.

This unique theatrical event is inspired by the words and images of tribal peoples featured in the recently published book ‘WE ARE ONE – a celebration of tribal peoples’, created and edited by Jo Eede and published by Quadrille Publishing, to mark the 40th anniversary of Survival.

Survival is a human rights organization that campaigns for tribal peoples, helping them to protect their lives, lands and futures. Mark Rylance has been a supporter of Survival for many years. He said: "As a child, I was enriched and inspired by the lives and stories of the world’s tribal peoples. As an adult, I have also been inspired by the ceaseless work of the organization Survival International, and their movement to protect these tribes – from the rainforest of the Amazon to the icy reaches of the Arctic.

“A new anthology called ‘We are One’ portrays tribal peoples today – their communities, art, humour, rituals, languages and wisdom, as well as their connections to their homelands and their struggle for recognition and survival – through a powerful collection of prose, poetry and photographs.

“To celebrate 40 years of Survival’s work and enjoy the beauty of the spoken word from such rich oral cultures, I am gathering my friends from the theatre on the set of Jerusalem for a wonderful spring afternoon of eloquent recitals and stunning images from ’We are One’.

“To hear such moving words from our brothers and sisters who still live so intimately attached to their lands, is to be reminded that they have much to share with the world, and that we all have a deep need for a sense of belonging to each other, and to nature.”

Details of the evening: Sunday 18th April, 5 – 7pm, Apollo Theatre, 39-45 Shaftesbury Avenue, London W1D 7EZ

Ticket prices: £20, £35, £50, £100 (£100 includes an invitation to the after-show party).
Telephone: 0871 297 0741, or www.nimaxtheatres.com

For further information contact Miriam Ross at +44-(0)20 7687 8734

(*cast subject to availability)

Notes to editors:

The anthology ‘We are One’ is a collection of statements from the world’s tribal peoples, from the Yanomami of the Brazilian Amazon, to the semi-nomadic Penan of Malaysia and the Innu of Canada’s sub-arctic tundra. These are supported by powerful essays and extracts from Richard Gere, Zac Goldsmith, Colin Firth, Bruce Parry, Jane Goodall, Joanna Lumley, Damien Hirst, Satish Kumar, Tony Juniper, Jonathan Porritt, Arundhati Roy, A.C. Grayling, Laurens van der Post, Doris Pilkington-Garimara, and many others.

The book is illustrated with photographs by leading photojournalists, including: Sebastiao Salgado, Mike Goldwater, Steve McCurry, Mirella Ricciardi, Carol Beckwith, Yann-Arthus Bertrand, Tim Allen, Claudia Andujar.

We Are One celebrates the lives, homelands, rituals, languages, ideas and values of tribal peoples and explores the relevance of their knowledge and beliefs to the present time. It is both a portrait of the beauty and diversity of tribal peoples, and a call to arms that examines many of the contemporary humanitarian and environmental issues inherent in their fight for survival.

Twenty-one of the uncontacted Indians known to use the reserve recently made off-limits to oil and gas companies.
© Heinz Plenge Pardo / Frankfurt Zoological Society

A reserve inhabited by uncontacted tribes in the remote Peruvian Amazon can no longer be explored by oil and gas companies.

The Madre de Dios Reserve was created in 2002, but three years later a Chinese company, Sapet, was given permission to work there in an area known as ‘Lot 113’. Sapet’s contract has now expired and, according to a Perupetro map dated 31 December 2009, the reserve is not to be included in the latest ‘auction’ of land to companies currently scheduled to be held in May.

Twenty-one of the uncontacted Indians who live in the reserve were photographed from the air just over two years ago.

‘The news of the definitive elimination of ‘Lot 113’ from Perupetro’s oil maps is an important decision because, as well as guaranteeing the integrity of isolated peoples in Madre de Dios, it is an excellent precedent for the protection of isolated peoples in other regions and countries whose territories are included in oil lots,’ said local indigenous organization FENAMAD.

In 2006 Sapet agreed not to work in the reserve after lobbying by FENAMAD and national indigenous organization AIDESEP. But Perupetro maps described the reserve as open for exploration until very recently.

In many other parts of Peru the government continues to allow companies such as Perenco, Repsol YPF and Petrobras to work on uncontacted tribes’ land.

Survival director, Stephen Corry, said today, ‘It’s great news that the Madre de Dios Reserve has been excluded from Perupetro’s oil lots. Peru must now apply that precedent to elsewhere in the country and make sure that no region inhabited by uncontacted Indians is invaded by oil and gas companies – especially in the upcoming auction.’

A Mayan woman during a kite festival at Santiago Sacatepequez, Guatemala
© Christophe Chat-Verre/Survival

The Constitutional Court of Guatemala has adopted ILO Convention 169 on indigenous and tribal peoples into the country’s Constitution.

Guatemala ratified Convention 169, the only international law for tribal peoples, in 1996. It is one of twenty countries to have ratified the Convention, which recognizes tribal peoples’ land rights and says they should be consulted prior to the approval of any projects on their lands.

The Court ruled that all the rights provided for in the Convention have constitutional status, which means that the State must consult with indigenous people before approving any mining and hydroelectric licenses, laws and regulations in their territories.

The ruling is a success for Guatemala’s indigenous peoples, the Maya, Garifuna and Xinca, giving them greater control over projects that affect them. It is also significant for tribal peoples across the world, showing the growing strength of Convention 169.

Survival is calling on all countries to ratify ILO Convention 169; the more countries that do so, the greater force it will have.

UN Special Rapporteur Prof. James Anaya has called for 'urgent' action on water for the Bushmen
© Colegio de Antropólogos de Chile

Report demands ‘urgent’ action by government over water

The UN’s top official on indigenous rights has condemned Botswana’s continued persecution of the Bushmen in a new report.

Prof. James Anaya, UN Special Rapporteur for indigenous peoples, highlights the government’s harassment of the Bushmen and Bakgalagadi tribes in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, who, despite winning a 2006 High Court ruling that their eviction from the reserve was unlawful, continue to face ill-treatment.

In the report Prof Anaya writes that the ‘denial of services to those currently living in the reserve does not appear to be in keeping with the spirit and underlying logic of the [2006 High Court] decision, nor with the relevant international human rights standards.’

He states that, ‘Indigenous people who have remained or returned to the reserve face harsh and dangerous conditions due to a lack of access to water, a situation that could be easily remedied by reactivating the boreholes in the reserve. The Government should reactive the boreholes or otherwise secure access to water for inhabitants of the reserve as a matter of urgent priority.’

He also notes that, ‘the Government’s position that habitation of the reserve by the Basarwa [Bushmen] and Bakgalagadi communities is incompatible with the reserve’s conservation objectives and status appears to be inconsistent with its decision to permit Gem Diamonds/Gope Exploration Company (Pty) Ltd. to conduct mining activities within the reserve, an operation that is planned to last several decades and could involve an influx of 500-1200 people to the site, according to the mining company.’

Finally he recommends that the Government should ‘fully and faithfully implement’ the 2006 High Court ruling and facilitate ‘the return of all those removed from the reserve who wish to do so, allowing them to engage in subsistence hunting and gathering in accordance with traditional practices, and providing them the same government services available to Botswanans elsewhere, including, most immediately, access to water’.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘Criticism is now growing of the government’s continued, appalling refusal to allow the Bushmen access to water. It is deeply unpleasant, bullying behaviour, and shocks those who learn about it. Survival now directly reaches more than a million people and we will ensure they know about this. It’s astonishing that the government continues to behave in this way. As long as it does so, the Bushmen issue will remain a cancer at the heart of Botswana’s international reputation.’

The children of Ms Buddhapati Chakma, who was shot dead by soldiers, speak to local journalists.
© Satrong Chakma

Calm is returning to the Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh after last week’s attacks on the Jumma tribal people by the Bangladesh army and settlers.

However, reports from the area suggest that thousands of Jummas have been made homeless after settlers, supported by the army, burnt more than 400 tribal houses to the ground.

Two Buddhist temples, two churches and a school were also burnt down. Tensions had been raised when settlers, supported by soldiers, expanded their settlements on Jumma land.

After the attacks in Baghaihat, where at least two people were shot dead by the army and hundreds of homes were razed to the ground, the violence spread to other areas of the Chittagong Hill Tracts. More than 60 Jumma houses were destroyed in the Khagrachari region. Restrictions on movement, and fear that they would be attacked by settlers, or arrested under false charges, made it difficult for many Jummas to venture out of hiding, and hampered efforts to confirm the number of dead and injured.

The EU has condemned the attacks and called for an independent investigation into the incident, and for those responsible to be brought to justice. Jumma groups and organizations such as Survival International, Amnesty and the CHT Commission, have also condemned the attacks and called for an investigation. There have been peaceful demonstrations in Bangladesh, India, USA, Britain and Australia.

Hundreds of thousands of settlers have been moved into the Hill Tracts over the last sixty years, in a policy supported by successive governments, displacing the eleven Jumma tribes and subjecting them to violent repression.

In 1997 the government and the Jummas signed a peace accord that committed the government to removing military camps from the region and to ending the theft of Jumma land by settlers and the army. The accord offered hope, but military camps remain in the Hill Tracts and violence and land grabbing continue.

Yanomami mother and child.
© Steve Cox/Survival

Yanomami shaman and spokesman Davi Kopenawa has made an urgent appeal for support as the Yanomami territory in northern Brazil is being invaded by gold-miners.

Davi said, ‘The arrival of miners is increasing, and the Yanomami are very worried… Soon there will be conflicts between the miners and the Yanomami… I know how the miners treat the Yanomami and I am also very sad because some Yanomami are working at the mining sites in return for food. They will fall ill; they’ll catch malaria and sexually transmitted infections, because the miners will use the Indian women as they have done in the past’.

He added, ‘I am very angry with FUNAI (the Brazilian government’s indigenous affairs department) and the police; they have not controlled the entrance of miners. The Yanomami territory is being invaded’.

Davi Yanomami’s warning comes just months after he met with President Lula to ask him to remove all the gold-miners working illegally in the Yanomami territory.

The Yanomami’s land is recognized as an indigenous territory and it is illegal for miners to operate there. However, it is estimated that over 1,000 miners are in the area and the Yanomami warn now of a further influx.

The miners transmit diseases such as malaria and flu which are potentially fatal for the Yanomami who have little resistance to such introduced diseases. 500 new cases of malaria were found in the Yanomami population of Brazil in 2009. Their total population there is around 16,000.

The miners also pollute the rivers with mercury, contaminating drinking water and fish consumed by the Indians.

Yanomami health is suffering and critical medical care is not reaching them because of corruption and incompetence in Brazil’s National Health Foundation (FUNASA).

The danger of violence to the Yanomami is ever present as the miners are usually armed.

During the 1980s, the Yanomami suffered immensely when up to 40,000 Brazilian gold-miners invaded their land. Miners killed some Yanomami, destroyed many villages, and exposed them to diseases to which they had no immunity. Twenty percent of the Yanomami died in just seven years.

If the miners now working illegally on Yanomami land are not evicted as a matter of urgency, the Indians risk similar destruction and death.

Please write to the President of Brazil and ask him to take urgent action to remove the miners.

A Kwegu boy outside his hut. The Omo Valley tribes are finding it hard to feed their children in these times of drought.
© Survival

Many tribal people in the Lower Omo Valley in Ethiopia are starving as the region is in the grip of a drought and the river’s annual flood has failed.

The Kwegu, a small hunter-gatherer tribe, have been badly hit. Survival has received reports that two Kwegu children and four adults died from hunger in November.

A Kwegu man sent this message: ‘Go and give this news to your elders, we Kwegu people are hungry. Other tribes have cattle, they can drink milk and blood. We don’t have cattle; we eat from the Omo River. We depend on the fish, they are like our cattle. If the Omo floods are gone we will die.’

The rains have not fallen properly for three years in the Omo Valley, home to eight different tribes and around 200,000 people. The annual flood of the Omo River, a lifeline for the region, has decreased in recent years, and in 2009 it failed completely.

A Mun tribesman said, ‘Before the flood waters would come and we would have big cultivation sites. Now, all the cultivation sites … have got no water.’

It is not clear why the rains have stopped, or why the flood failed. What is clear, is that the Gibe cascade – a series of five dams planned for the Omo River – is likely to stretch an already strained region, and its people, to breaking point.

Some Kwegu blame the dam. One said, ‘Our land has become bad. They closed the water off tight and we know hunger. Open the dam and let the water flow.’

Gibe I is already complete, damming one of the tributaries of the Omo River. The Gibe II dam blocks the same river, and recently was a major source of embarrassment for the Ethiopian government and Italian firm Salini Construttori, after part of it collapsed just ten days after opening.

The Gibe III dam is about one third complete. A 50 meter cofferdam was recently built as part of the ongoing dam construction. Some believe it may have contributed to the lack of the annual flood.

If completed, Gibe III will be the second largest hydroelectric dam in Africa.

Experts warn it will irrevocably devastate the Omo River’s flood cycle, which is crucial to the Omo Valley tribes’ livelihood and survival.

The Ethiopian government claims Gibe III, aside from generating enough electricity to power the country several times over, will increase the safety of the downstream tribes by stopping giant floods from sweeping away livestock and people. But the tribes are clear – without the annual flood, they cannot survive.

A Mun tribesman said, ‘Now that the floods are gone we have a big problem. We are afraid of death. The rainy season hasn’t come for three years. Why haven’t the rains been working all this time? Did the sky not sign his work papers? Did he forget to work?’

‘There is no singing and dancing all along the Omo River now. The people are too hungry. The kids are quiet.’

‘The big rains have been gone for three years and now, we come to the Omo and there is no water.’

Work is in full flow on dams in the Penan's area.
© Survival

The CEO of the company overseeing a massive dam project on Penan tribal land in the Malaysian part of Borneo has come under scrutiny in his native Norway over violations of indigenous rights.

Norway’s Dagbladet newspaper questioned Sarawak Energy CEO Torstein Sjøtveit about the impact the project would have on the Penan. Sjøtveit claimed the Penan had been consulted, and that his company was complying with UN rules.

The UN states that developments on indigenous peoples’ land may only take place with their free, prior and informed consent. But the Penan affected by the Murum hydroelectric dam say they have been told they have no choice but to leave their land.

Dagbladet quotes a Penan man named Matu: ‘Those who want to take over our land… will not allow us to fish, hunt or collect berries and plants.’

Sjøtveit told Dagbladet that 1,350 people would be affected by the Murum dam project. He continued, ‘We are facing a dilemma between the need for development of the resources of the wider society and the wishes of the indigenous people to stay and live where they are.’

In September, six Penan and nine other indigenous people were arrested while trying to hand in a statement about their opposition to the dams to the office of Sarawak’s Chief Minister.

The Human Rights Commission of Malaysia, in a report on the Murum dam project, notes, ‘Instead of giving options to the Indigenous communities on whether or not to be resettled, the ‘consultations’ were carried out by the Government was [sic] only used as a mechanism to inform the communities of the Government’s decision and its impact towards those communities.’

The Murum dam is the first in a new series of large-scale hydroelectric projects being planned by the Sarawak state government, which will displace thousands of indigenous people. Critics in Malaysia have argued that the dams are superfluous to Sarawak’s energy needs.

Penan who were resettled to make way for Sarawak’s existing Bakun dam are unable to hunt or gather, and find it difficult to grow enough food on the small plots of land provided for them.

Applying traditional face paint to an Aboriginal boy, dance festival, Northern Queensland, Australia
© John Miles/Survival

A group of Alyawarr Aborigines have abandoned their central Australian settlement, and set up a new community at a place called Honeymoon Bore.

Banjo Morton, who led the move, said that they’d been treated as outcasts and not involved in decisions about their community, especially since the federal indigenous ‘intervention’ policy began in 2007.

The ‘intervention’ was a reaction to a report citing widespread child abuse amongst Aborigine communities. The government’s response was to send police and troops to many remote communities, with special bans on alcohol and pornography.

Control was wrested from community leaders and there was almost no consultation or involvement with the Aborigines themselves. The intervention has been rejected by remote communities and criticized by the UN as discriminatory.

Honeymoon Bore is just outside the area covered by the intervention, so the community is able to take control of its way of life and its future. Mr Morton told journalists, ‘We feel free and happy here, away from all the rules and interference of the intervention.’

Currently about 70 people are now living in the new settlement, in tents and crude shelters. Although their current situation is basic, it is better than the overcrowding in the old settlement where raw sewage was ankle deep in some houses and people had no say in decisions made about their lives.

Richard Downs, another Alyawarr leader, has said that he envisages the community growing and becoming a genuine indigenous ‘utopia’. He said, ‘Our aim is to show that Aboriginal people can break the cycle of dependency, that we can look after ourselves on our country.’

Survival’s Progress Can Kill campaign highlights how loss of land and control over their way of life has been disastrous for tribal communities all over the world. It often leads to dependency, depression, suicides and substance abuse.

Steps by communities, such as those at Honeymoon Bore, to take back control over their lives, their lands and their way of life, offer a glimmer of hope for tribal peoples around the world.

Dongria Kondh take part in the festival on top of Niyam Dongar Mountain.
© Survival

The Dongria Kondh tribe in India this weekend held their annual festival of worship on the top of their sacred mountain, which UK company Vedanta Resources is determined to mine for aluminium ore.

Hundreds of people danced and sang on top of their sacred mountain in Orissa State’s Niyamgiri Hills. The festival is usually only open to worshipers but this year the Dongria Kondh allowed journalists and activists to attend, to demonstrate the importance of their mountain to the outside world.

Dongria man Dodi has said, ‘Niyam Rajah is our god and we worship him. We cannot stop worshipping. This god is not for any government. He is there for us Adivasis [tribal peoples], …This place does not belong to any government.’

Neither Vedanta nor the Orissa government have consulted the Dongria Kondh about the mine planned for their sacred mountain. The project is rapidly becoming the most controversial mining venture in the world.

Vedanta has been trying to mine for aluminium ore in the Dongria’s land for several years, but local resistance, legal challenges and growing international outrage have so far stopped the project. Vedanta needs the ore to feed the refinery it has already built at the foot of the hills. The refinery, recently condemned by Amnesty International, left more than a hundred families landless and polluted the groundwater, a fact acknowledged by the state pollution board.

Dongria man Lodu said, ‘Now people in that area have realized and now they are speaking out against it. Vedanta has snatched everything away from them… they have become beggars.’

The Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust is the most recent investor to dump Vedanta’s shares over human rights concerns, following the Church of England and the Norwegian government. The UK government has also condemned Vedanta, saying a change in the company’s behaviour is ‘essential.’

The central government of India has not issued final clearance to Vedanta’s mine, and the Minister for Environment and Forests told journalists that ‘there is still hope for Niyamgiri’.

Stephen Corry, Survival’s director, said today, ‘This weekend, the Dongria Kondh have demonstrated to the world how vital their sacred mountain is to them. Yet Vedanta is determined to destroy this site in blatant breach of its duty to respect the Dongria’s human rights. The tide is turning: investors are showing Vedanta that it cannot get away with such behaviour. Now the Indian government must protect the rights of its citizens and stop this mine once and for all.’

The children of Ms Buddhapati Chakma, who was shot dead by soldiers, speak to local journalists.
© Satrong Chakma

Reliable sources report that at least six Jumma tribal people were killed, and hundreds of houses burnt to the ground, in an attack by soldiers and settlers on tribal villages in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh on Saturday. The attacks took place in the Sajek region, where tensions have been rising since Bengali settlers, supported by the army, have been expanding their settlements on Jumma land.

Local reports state that soldiers shot indiscriminately at Jumma villagers after one soldier was injured during clashes. Many other Jummas were hurt. Settlers, aided by the security forces, set fire to, and destroyed, five villages, consisting of at least 200 houses. A Buddhist temple and a church have also been burnt down. Thousands of Jummas have fled to the jungle to escape from the soldiers and settlers.

The local administration has imposed an order known as section 144, which prohibits the assembly of five or more people and the holding of public meetings. This is hampering the Jumma’s efforts to establish the whereabouts of missing people and to confirm the numbers killed. Two bullet-ridden bodies have been recovered (those of Mr Lakkhi Bijoy Chakma (40) and Ms Buddhapati Chakma (36)), but tribal leaders report that the army has removed the bodies of several other Jummas who were killed during the incident.

Hundreds of thousands of settlers have been moved into the Hill Tracts over the last sixty years, in a policy supported by successive governments, displacing the eleven Jumma tribes and subjecting them to violent repression.

In 1997 the government and the Jummas signed a peace accord that committed the government to removing military camps from the region and to ending the theft of Jumma land by settlers and the army. The accord offered hope, but military camps remain in the Hill Tracts and violence and land grabbing continue.

Survival’s director, Stephen Corry said, ‘This horrific incident is just the latest in a long line of brutal attacks on the Jumma tribal people. They have been killed, tortured and raped, and their lands stolen, for far too long. We call on the government of Bangladesh to put an end to army violence in the Chittagong Hill Tracts and to withdraw the army camps, as promised in the peace accord. Those responsible for this atrocity must be brought to justice.’

Note to editors: Survival has pictures from the incident.
Contact Miriam Ross: mr@survivalinternational.org

Note to UK editors: Jumma people living in London will protest outside the Bangladesh High Commission on Wednesday 24th of February at 10 am.

The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has recommended that the Endorois tribe in Kenya be given back its land, after they were evicted from it to make way for a nature reserve in the 1970s.

Kipsan Kipkazi, of the Endorois Welfare Council, said, ‘We are delighted that the African Commission has recognised the wrong that was done decades ago.’ The ruling comes after a legal battle between the government of Kenya and the Endorois tribe, supported by Minority Rights Group and the Centre for Minority Rights Development in Kenya.

The Endorois are a semi-nomadic tribe who herded cattle and goats through Kenya’s Rift Valley for centuries. In the early 1970s they were forced from their land, to create the Lake Bogoria National Reserve. The Reserve is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Indigenous land rights are not widely recognised in Africa, and this is the first time that the African Commission has upheld these rights. The ruling recommends that the Endorois be granted ‘unrestricted access’ to Lake Bogoria, royalties from existing economic activities in the area (mostly tourism), and the right of ownership and full restitution of their ancestral land.

In another part of Kenya, the Ogiek tribe are seeking to ensure their rights over the Mau forest are not ignored as the government attempts to deal with the severe environmental degradation caused by deforestation and settlement by outsiders. Kenya’s Prime Minister Raila Odinga has said no Ogiek will be evicted, and the Ogiek are cautiously hopeful that he will keep his word.

A bulldozer works on a road built through Ayoreo-Totobiegosode land, Paraguay
© Survival

A global letter-writing campaign to protect the lives of uncontacted Indians in Paraguay has been launched by Survival.

Paraguay is home to the only uncontacted Indians outside the Amazon basin, but their lands are being rapidly destroyed for beef production. Contacted members of the tribe, known as the Ayoreo-Totobiegosode, have been trying to claim legal title to a small part of their ancestral territory since 1993, but most of it is still in private hands.

A Brazilian ranching company, Yaguarete Porá, has announced plans to clear a large part of their 78,000 hectare estate, even though uncontacted Ayoreo-Totobiegosode Indians are known to use the area. The estate is within the 1993 land claim.

The campaign targets Paraguay’s President Lugo, who has so far failed to live up to pre-election promises to protect indigenous lands from invasion.

Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said today, ‘The plight of the uncontacted Ayoreo-Totobiegosode is desperate. They’re seeing their forests literally bulldozed around them by cattle ranchers who are hell-bent on destroying large parts of it. Why should the Indians have to flee from one corner of the forest to the other? They simply want to live there in peace, and under the law they have that right.’

Three more shareholders have disinvested from Vedanta Resources.
© Survival

Survival welcomes the news that the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust is selling its shares in Vedanta Resources due to concerns over the company’s human rights record. Two other shareholders, the Marlborough Ethical Fund and Millfield House Foundation, have also sold their shares.

Survival is campaigning for all shareholders to pull out of the company, and has been lobbying the Rowntree Trust since July 2009.

The news is just the latest in a string of PR disasters for Vedanta. Last week Amnesty International released a report slamming the company for ‘failing to respect the human rights’ of the Dongria Kondh tribe of Orissa, India, on whose sacred mountain it plans to build a bauxite mine. The previous week the Church of England also sold its shares, saying, ’We are not satisfied that Vedanta has shown, or is likely in future to show, the level of respect for human rights and local communities that we expect…’

The British and Norwegian governments have both condemned the project, and Martin Currie Investments has also disinvested following pressure from Survival. The BP Pension Fund has reduced its shareholding over similar concerns.

Stephen Corry, Survival’s director, said today, ‘It is really encouraging to see shareholders taking indigenous rights seriously and refusing to bankroll Vedanta’s activities. They have found that ‘engagement’ with the company is fruitless: Vedanta is clearly determined to mine the Dongria Kondh’s sacred mountain. Vedanta is fast becoming the most controversial mining company in the world – controversy that ethical investors would be well advised to distance themselves from.’

Bushman man.
© Survival

Over 400 Bushmen were denied the right to vote in Botswana’s 2009 general election, with five Bushman communities inside the Central Kalahari Game Reserve omitted from the electoral register.

Speaking to Botswana’s Mmegi newspaper, Roy Sesana, Bushman spokesman, claimed, ‘People were living in those settlements during the elections. They did not vote when the rest of the nation went to the polls’. The revelations were confirmed by the District Commissioner and are the latest in a long line of assaults against the Bushmen’s rights.

Botswana’s president, Ian Khama, who was sworn in as the country’s fourth president after last year’s elections, has continuously flouted a 2006 High Court ruling that said the Bushmen have the right to live on their lands in the reserve. His government has denied them access to a borehole which they rely on for water, at the same time as drilling new boreholes for wildlife and supporting a safari lodge with swimming pool in the reserve.

Khama has also described the Bushmen’s way of life as an ‘archaic fantasy’, and a South African woman was recently arrested for remarking that he ‘looked like a Bushman’.

The Bushmen’s political marginalization was acknowledged in the latest US Department of State’s 2008 human rights report which said that they ‘lacked adequate political representation, and were not fully aware of their civil rights’. It also criticized the government for its ‘narrow interpretation of a 2006 high court ruling’.

The revelations emerged recently after Sesana told the same newspaper that attempts to negotiate with the government have broken down, as it failed to provide support for a representative team. The Bushmen have now lodged legal proceedings against the government in an attempt to gain access to their borehole.

Survival’s director, Stephen Corry, said, ‘It’s no surprise that the government excluded the Bushmen from the election; they have been treated like second-class citizens for years. Why would the government give voting rights to the Bushmen when it won’t even let them have water?’

Yali, Papua
© Jerry Callow/Survival

Viktor Kaisiepo, the dedicated and charismatic Papuan activist, has died aged 61 in the Netherlands. Viktor was an indefatigable campaigner for the rights of the peoples of West Papua, and for other indigenous peoples.

Viktor spent his early years in West Papua but his family moved to the Netherlands when the territory was handed over to Indonesia in 1962. He lived in the Netherlands for the rest of his life, always pushing for the rights of the Papuan people to be heard and respected.

Viktor was the European Representative of the Papuan Council of the Papuan Presidium (PDP) as well as International Representative of the Dewan Adat Papua (DAP), the Indigenous Papuan Council. He was involved in lobbying Jakarta to engage in genuine dialogue with the Papuan people. He was a regular visitor to the United Nations, for many years working alongside Survival in bringing the plight of the Papuan people to the attention of the UN Human Rights Commission.

All who met him will remember Viktor Kaisiepo. His dedication, conviction and charm must have inspired hundreds of people over the years to take up the cause of the Papuan peoples’ struggle. Our condolences go to his family and friends in the Netherlands, West Papua and beyond.

Dani man, Papua
© Adrian Arbib/Survival

The Indonesian government has banned a book on the repression of human rights in Papua. The book, by respected Papuan churchman Rev. Socratez Sofyan Yoman, is one of five books to have been banned in a move that appears to hark back to the authoritarian Suharto era.

Rev. Yoman’s book, ‘The Voice of Churches for Suppressed People, Blood and God’s Tears in West Papua,’ has been banned by the Indonesian Attorney General’s office. The office is also said to be evaluating 200 other books it considers to be too provocative.

The Justice and Human Rights Minister Patrialis Akbar said that his ministry had judged 20 books to be ‘very dangerous to the public,’ and would recommend that they be banned. The ministry also cited ‘provocative motives to disintegrate the nation’ as a reason for banning the books.

Among the books believed to be on the list is ‘The Indigenous World 2009’, published by the International Working Group for Indigenous Affairs and launched at the UN in New York. Another is believed to be a translation of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, which Indonesia voted for at the UN General Assembly.

Indonesia’s Human Rights Commission has also criticized the government for not upholding human rights in Papua. Matius Murib from the Commission’s Papua branch said the criminalization of Papuan civilians had escalated significantly in 2009, and that human rights activists were being closely watched and intimidated.

Murib added that the government uses military and security approaches in dealing with Papuans rather than question whether its failure to respect Papuans’ basic rights might be the reason for their separatist demands.